I bought new an 04, F250XL SD V10, 6 speed manual, manual transfer case, 4.30 axles with hubs, extended cab truck (46k miles). I also own a 97 Toyota Land Cruiser that I hardly ever use (37k miles). I need my truck to tow my 12k 28' boat to the water every year and have it lifted off and into the water. Tow distance is 20 miles round trip. It's too much load for the Land Cruiser and max's out SD truck although it pulls it well. I want to sell both rigs and consolidate into one truck. Looking at an X for just this reason.

Can the X do the same job as my SD? Looking at buying a V10 version and if not equipted with 4.30's, swap out my F250 axles into the X and the X's into SD. Thoughts? I'm in no hurry to sell the F250 and have thought of swapping the springs, tires/rims & shocks as well.

Am I correct in assuming all X's have the D50 front axle and my F250 has the D60?

 

i dont tow, so i'm just going by what i've read. i think the Ex will do what you need even though your pushing the limits a bit.

yes the axles will swap directly between. now i'm not sure if the f250s had the D50 or D60 and or what years that changed. but the Ex does have a D50 far as i know.

i say go for it! you'll love the excursion! hope others can offer more help.

 

I know my front is the D60 as that was why I ordered it rather then the the F350. It would seem that as well as my truck runs and handles the towing, transferring the axles to an X and using an auto trans it should be as good as the SD was. I realize the towing limits will be exceeded somewhat but I'm not talking about long distance or high speeds. The towing of my boat is 10 miles one way and no faster then 55mph on very good road.

 

yeah i see no reason the excursion can not handle it. finding a nice condition low mile excursion may be your biggest hurdle lol

 

Is your '04 F250 coil sprung or leafed?

 

Leaf springs. Coil didn't come out until 05.

 

All 03+ superduties come with a D60 front

I just finished swapping My SD axles( and lift) onto my excursion.

 

So only 03,04 are able to be swapped in without a coil conversion?

 

Correct. One thing to watch for if you are swapping a 03+D60 into your ex is the wheel studs have a fine pitch. I had to swap my old wheelbearings from my 00 onto the newer axle so my aftermarket lugnuts would work with my aluminum rims

 

Dubbs19s: Was there anything unexpected from doing this. I plan on swapping axles, springs, blocks, shocks, rims & tires. Any issues with using the manual hubs on the D60 with the X electronic transfer case?

 

Nope..everything was a direct swap.

No issues with the manual hubs and electronic case...except you have to get out to lock them

If you are swapping SD shocks onto the EX...the rears are different.

also..the rear of the Ex is heavier than the SD and may sit lower....I put a bigger block in when I swapped the rears

 

I did the D50 to D60 swap on an 05 Excursion.

If you look in an interchange catalog you will see that D50 and D60 superduty front driveshafts have different part numbers for the same engine/transmission combination on SRW F250/350s. The D50 front drivehaft on an Excursion has the same part number as the D50 front driveshaft on SRW F250/350s with the same engine/transmission combination. So it stands to reason that the D60 Excursion should use the SRW F250/350 D60 driveshaft

The D60 front driveshaft is slightly shorter than the D50 front driveshaft (around 2 inches) for the same engine/transmission combination due to the pinion gears effect on the differential housings center section length. The D50 and D60 housings look the same but are different even though they use the same cover.

Other folks appear to have used the D50 driveshaft without any problems so this may be a non issue but I was concerned about bottoming out the slip joint when the suspension compressed.

As others have said you need to pay attention to the wheel stud thread pitch.

Otherwise the front axle swap is strait forward.

 

Since I plan on swapping both front and rear axles to gain the 4.30 gearing and use my SD wheels & tires, the wheel stud thread pitch is probably a non-issue. Thank you for the info on the driveshafts. I had been thinking about that as well. I'll be checking on that very closely and was planning on using as much of the SD as I could.

Since I'm now in the "looking" stage of finding a nice X to purchase, finding a 4.30 geared X would put a lot of this out of the picture. Knowing that these will be hard to find, I'm first looking for a low mileage, primo condition truck to build on. Thanks for all the replies and advice that has been offered. I'll be updating everyone on how well the search turns out.

 

Just curious why you would be swapping out the rear axle? Isn't it the same 10.5? Maybe I'm missing something...

Also, the longer front drive shaft on the Ex may be a benefit if you're raising the truck 6 or more inches... just a thought.

 

Since it is difficult to find a X with 4.30 gearing, "to gain the 4.30 gearing " I plan on swapping BOTH axles to keep everything matched up. It seems that 98% of all V10 X's have 3.73's. And yes it is the same 10.5, just a different ring and pinion. Much easier for me to swap axles then R&P's. I don't plan on lifting it more then 2-2.5" or enough to permit running 315's on it safely.